Stretchy 'pad' turns your arm into the ultimate flexible touchscreen

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At an event in New York, the China-based firm has revealed a new concept for personalised laptops – a laptop that is able to bend in half, be folded down, and also contains a built-in keyboard.

Lenovo says the idea will use "new screen technologies" to allow it to be folded when not in use. The image of the concept released by the firm shows a screen that stretches across most of the laptop and curves towards the keyboard. Lenovo added that the device will be controlled by voice and its pointing stick that's used on current ThinkPads from the firm.

Stretchy 'pad' turns your arm into the ultimate flexible touchscreen

Other details revealed around the product are incredibly vague and it's unlikely that the device will ever be created. We don't know if work has started on the concept, what sort of new technologies would be used for the screen and even if it would be practical to mostly interact with a laptop using voice (Siri, Alexa, Cortana, and other virtual assistants still operate at a basic level).

Yet, it shows the way Lenovo is thinking and how it views personal devices in the future. It isn't the first time the company has teased bendable technology. Last year, the company unveiled a phone that has a flexible screen and can wrap around a person's wrist. Dubbed the CPlus, the phone has a 4.26-inch bendy display, runs Android and, unfortunately, isn't in production.

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Elsewhere, the promise of bendable phones and laptops has been around for a long time – without any products actually coming to market. Researchers from Queen's University, Canada, created a useful flexible phone called ReFlex. The device has a 720p LG flexible OLED touchscreen, runs Android, and has a haptic actuator to detect when a phone is bent. It then uses the sensor to detect when the phone is being bent and control the device.

Samsung has previously demonstrated a foldable phone that it plans to release in the near future; Microsoft has patented a device; and LG is working on a folding device.

Away from bending screen technology, scientists in South Korea have created ultra-thin solar cells that are flexible and can be wrapped around a pencil.

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